Why People Pirate: The Story Of Avatar

from the three-years-later dept

When I began thinking about writing this post, I wanted to start with the opening line "Remember Avatar?" Then I stopped, shook my head, and figured that such an opening line would be ridiculous. After all, Avatar is the highest worldwide grossing movie of all time. Despite everyone on the planet apparently believing that the movie was based on something they had themselves done, the movie essentially ushered in the era of the 3D movie experience for our generation. I mean, come on, it's Avatar.

But then I thought about it a little longer. When's the last time I heard anyone talk about this groundbreaking movie? Months ago? Years ago? Wait, when did this thing come out? 2009? Is that really correct? Is anyone really thinking about this movie anymore? So, because of all those questions, I give you this:

Remember Avatar? You should, for all the reasons mentioned above, but you may see the movie mentioned again now that Fox will finally release the 3D Collector's Edition Blu-Ray of the film. It's one hell of a release window for the 3D version of the movie. And some, like Gizmodo, are pointing to story of how it happened to explain why people turn to infringment for the entertainment they want.

On April 22, 2010, [Avatar] is released on DVD. It's now August 14, 2012. In what world does it make sense for the movie that basically defibrillated the entire notion of 3D movies to take three damn years to make a wide release on 3D Blu-ray? Ours, apparently.

Here's how we got here: Panasonic got in bed with Avatar early on, promoting the film with 103 trucks with giant 3D TVs on them. That was kind of cool, actually. But then, it turned out you could only buy the 3D Blu-ray with a Panasonic 3D TV. Which turned out to cost, all things considered, about 300 damn dollars for a $30 Blu-ray, no matter how you spun it. Totally dumb, totally anti-consumer.

So, through a complicated series of exclusive contract hoops, Fox essentially set up a monetary obstacle course all the way back in late 2010. If you wanted Avatar in 3D, you had to buy a television at a price that far exceeded any added value from the movie. You know who likes obstacle courses built almost two years ago? Time-travelling hamsters, that's who. Last time I checked, there aren't a great deal of time-travelling hamsters paying for movies.

And neither were the people who wanted the 3D version of Avatar, apparently. Panasonic posted huge losses in the television space. Avatar went on to become the most pirated movie of all time. And the Gizmodo piece points the finger directly at Fox:

All of this matters. Especially right now. Demonoid just went down for the count. The RIAA and MPAA want the US to stomp on the Pirate Bay the same way. And we're just a few months removed from the Supreme Court declining to hear an appeal for a $675,000 fine levied against Joel Tenenbaum for, as a teen, downloading a few dozen songs. The subtext is clear. It's not even subtext—it's super-text. We are the assholes. It's our fault that movies are bad and the music industry can't figure out how to monetize itself. And the copyright gestapo is coming for us. That's the message, the threat, looming over every idiotic decision that pushes us closer to BitTorrent.

And in the meantime, as all of this anti-consumer-ish-ness is being dolled up in a wig and a makeup and called "a business model", fans of Avatar will finally be able to get the movie in 3D in October. Yes, a movie designed to be watched with cardboard skittles goggles on your head wasn't available across the board for three damned years. That isn't a release window. It's a message to the movie's fans:

Fox

Hate to say it, but if Fox gave a damn about me, Firefly would still be on the air, celebrating its 9th season and 100th or so episode and reality TV would be a distant memory of a failed business model.

However, in this case, Fox doesn't care about the tremendous piles of money they left on the table for what, an exclusive deal that nobody in their right mind would have approved. That is the tragedy of the monopoly, someone else could have monetized better and Steven Spielberg could have walked away with far more money. But he chose a bad distributor and got locked into the deal. I hope he learned from his mistake and took the distribution rights somewhere else, along with assuring the contract he wrote with the next distributor included a back-out clause if the distributor didn't do their job.

Re: Fox

Re: Fox

"Hate to say it, but if Fox gave a damn about me, Firefly would still be on the air, celebrating its 9th season and 100th or so episode and reality TV would be a distant memory of a failed business model."

Sigh. And I was having such an awesome birthday so far til I read this and remembered that Firefly was cancelled after 1 season but we're on who knows what season of American Idol and America's Got Talent and the rest of the Fox line-up which consist of similar nonsense.

Re: Re: Re: Fox

Re: Re: Fox

And I was having such an awesome birthday so far til I read this and remembered that Firefly was cancelled after 1 season but we're on who knows what season of American Idol and America's Got Talent and the rest of the Fox line-up which consist of similar nonsense.

Sorry about that.

In the words of Marvin the Paranoid Android, "I'm so depressed."

I'm cynical of anything Fox does any more. They made a big deal about "Terra Nova", only to cancel it after one season. I thought it was good...though they jumped the shark at the end. Every show on Fox I've ever been interested in watching they cancelled prematurely, with Futurama being the only one that lasted longer than a Season.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Fox

Re: Re: Re: Fox

I'm cynical of anything Fox does any more. They made a big deal about "Terra Nova", only to cancel it after one season. I thought it was good...though they jumped the shark at the end. Every show on Fox I've ever been interested in watching they cancelled prematurely, with Futurama being the only one that lasted longer than a Season.

I've never watched much TV, but I've pretty much totally stopped (sit through a SVU & Burn Notice with the wife that's it) at this point for exactly this reason. Any show I find even vaguely interesting gets cancelled within a season or two; what's the point of getting invested in a show only to have the rug pulled out from under you? If the networks have no buy-in for their shows why should I?

Re: Fox

"Hate to say it, but if Fox gave a damn about me, Firefly would still be on the air, celebrating its 9th season and 100th or so episode and reality TV would be a distant memory of a failed business model."

Ah, that must mean they give a damn about me then... well, at least the can canceling Firefly part. Thanks Fox.

Re: Fox

When I was in College, a friend lent me a burnt copy of the entire Firefly season. I devoured it. I then turned countless friends and family onto it who in turn went and bought the season on dvd (like me) and stood in line to watch the movie years later (like me) and again, buying the movie dvd when released (like me).

Not saying that my family and friends couldn't find out about it any other way than me, but I had to literally force them to sit down and watch an entire episode with me before they got hooked. All those dvd seasons and movie tickets and dvd sales had come from a pirated copy.

I'm not advocating stealing, I'm not saying it always works this way or couldn't have worked another way. Just saying what happened. A happily gave lots of money because I was a fan. I feel that they should simply focus on making stuff that I can be a fan of. I'll HAPPILY give you my money in return for that. But no, I don't need another TV...

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You forgot to show concern for distantly related industries ("If the pirates win, the corn farmers lose."), concern for terrorism ("If the pirates win, the terrorists win.") most imporatnly you didn't show concern for the children ("Supporting piracy means you support child porn.").

Re:

You forgot to add that your missed expectations are the result of your unrealistic sense of entitlement and you should just be happy with whatever hollywood deems to give when, and for how much they decide, to give it to you.

Market for 3D

Like, how big is the market for 3D? Don't you need a 3D TV, and the high-end headache maker goggles? So, not only did they limit the target audience, they waited 3 years to release it? And they call that a business model?

Re: Market for 3D

You need a 3D TV or projector, a pair of very expensive active shutter glasses (that may not induce headaches, but you're still watching movies with sunglasses on), a bluray player capable of outputting 3D, and the 3D bluray disc.

All to watch a movie that's pretty crappy.

Fox's marketing plan might be called "unobtainium"

I remember 2009 well: it was the year of Moon, Inglourious Bastards, A Serious Man, Up, District 9, and Anvil: The Story of Anvil. Why remember Avatar?

Re: Re: Re: Market for 3D

Re: Re: Re: Re: Market for 3D

I thought it was The Smurfs meets Dances With Wolves.

I pointed to Dune (the story and the movies) when I saw it. Outsider who is despised by the populous arrives, is introduced to a love interest and all around awesome warrior, then gets wrapped up in a conflict his people started and becomes the victor in an all out battle royale against his own kind in order to fulfill a prophecy.

When I saw the ending credits had "Dune Entertainment", I started laughing hysterically.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Market for 3D

Excuse me, but where was the prophecy in Avatar? I don't recall hearing about one.

Something about an outsider riding the biggest damn pterodactyl into battle, saving the people from the monster of the week. Haven't seen it in a while, but I am sure if you watch it again, you'll see it.

Sure, it was about something that happened in history, but the movie made no qualms about drawing parallels.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Market for 3D

Excuse me, but where was the prophecy in Avatar? I don't recall hearing about one.

More specifically, according to the IMDB Synopsis:

While flying on a hunting sortie, Jake and Neytiri are suddenly pursued and attacked by a creature known to the Na'vi as toruk, a giant and brightly-colored flying mountain banshee with murderous intentions toward everything that flies. Neytiri says its name means "last shadow" -- the toruk's shadow, once seen, is usually the "last shadow one ever gets to see," as its attack is almost always fatal. Back at Hometree, Neytiri shows Jake the skeleton of a precursor of the present toruk. She tells him the last person to ride a toruk was her grandfather's grandfather, who used the animal to unite the five Na'vi tribes in a time of great sorrow. Such a person would earn the title Toruk Mato, "Rider of the Last Shadow."

Re: Re: Re: Re: Market for 3D

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I wish I had thought of this before I commented, but can we start adding 'in space' to get new copyright protection the same way we add the words 'on the internet' or 'on a mobile device' to get more patent protection?

Re: Re: Re: Market for 3D

I haven't actually seen "Avatar". But when I saw the trailer I recognized the plot and inferred the entire story line --a guess which turned out to agree 100% with the reviews and clips I saw later. So in a sense I have seen it. Except that I can write better dialogue (not that I'm boasting-- I know teenagers who could write better dialogue).

Re: Re: Market for 3D

Well, a Mac Mini hooked up to a 52" LCD, with an Aiwa 5:1 sound system played the 1080p 2D extended version of mine just fine. No 3D TV, no Blu-Ray player, no horny paper headache-maker glasses, no physical media whatsoever, just a nice clean .mkv file. I paid more for the popcorn, VPN and Internet than the Pocahontis, er, Dances With Wolves remake.

Re: Market for 3D

Not sure how big the market is but I don't think it's as big as they hoped it'd be.

I am the IT department for an engineering/surveying firm and we were in the market for a huge (as in HUGE) television to put in my boss' office (for personal use as well as video conferencing and as a monitor for a conference desktop computer).

He's a Samsung fan and the only big tv they had at our preferred local retailer was a 65" Samsung 3D TV. It was going for about $3500 when I ordered it (cost be damned as he put it), when I went to the store to pick it up not only had they lowered the price nearly $1000 (in the hour two hours it took me to receive pick up confirmation) but they also threw in a ton of stuff (2 sets of 3D glasses, HDMI cable, HDMI to DVI cable, etc).

We found that rather unusual. And afterwards it was no longer available for purchase (when I checked online to see the "new" price).

In related news, my boss hated the 3D aspect of the TV and wanted something bigger, so about a week later we eventually got a newer Sharp AQUOS 80" TV (no 3D, thank goodness).

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Well, the business is actually doing really well. Lots of state and federal contracts. It was honestly the first serious expenditure since I came onboard (and it was for a legitimate purpose, video conferencing and presentations).

As for that 65", sadly I didn't get to take it home. Lol. It ended up in one of our smaller off-site offices. Although, I'm slowly saving the company a ton of money by pushing for changes in ISPs and hosting companies and whatnot, definitely going to come up with a proposal for why the company should get me a 16 GB Nexus 7 (here's hoping the boss approves and lets me purchase it, today's my day after all). : )

Re: Re: Re: Market for 3D

Every business is in business to make money, you need that as a resource to continue doing business.

However, irritating the source of the money, the consumer, is not good business. You would think that a corporation that's been in the game as long as Fox would understand that and attempt to respect their consumers so as to get more money.

Corporate monopoly and corporate greed is slowly, like a snail moving,dying. You can't control the Internet. You can't pass laws and hope that will take care of piracy. Internet WILL find a way. That being said, to comment about this article,I think this is a perfect example of how these companies are slowly losing their old, crappy business model.

Avatar

Bit of a trip down a branch of the Hollywood Habitrail, but why am I seeing these big announcements about Jaws finally coming out on BluRay this week? Why is it news and why is it happening now instead of I dunno how many years ago? Jaws, for cryin' out loud.

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Because they took their time with Jaws. If you look at the documentary they created showing the restoration, you can see that it was a labor of love. I'm grateful of the effort to do it right (if only they had released it for 2012 4th of July time... that would have been epic).

Now, take Avatar... it was filmed this way and required no adjustment. They literally had to press it to disc and ship it out. Why did that take 3 years?

Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

This isn't about entitlement. This is about pointing out the ridiculousness of windowing a release (FOR THREE GODDAMN YEARS) of perhaps the biggest movie in recent history.

By this point, people have already gotten over Avatar and there's little if any audience for a 3D copy of the movie to take home.

Windowed releases/delays make no sense in this day and age. If the regular version has been available since 2010, it makes sense that the 3D version would also be available at the same time (to play on the "AVATAR MADE 3D A HIT" thing).

It's also telling how to an extreme you take things. Says a lot about you.

Personal examples:

That line at Sam's Club. Too long. I put the stuff down and leave. Make my purchases elsewhere (or online).

Date doesn't think I'm loveable. Shrug and try harder on the next date. (Or find out what's wrong, because I'm a pretty decent guy, and obviously she's mad about something.)

Someone disrespects me, I ignore them or disrespect them in turn.

These are the reasonable actions to take in those situations. A 3D movie is NOT being sold for some reason I'll never know, yet is available online through less than legal (in some areas) means, I can see why a person would get it. There's no "loss" because the product wasn't legally being offered in the first place. "Shut up and take my money!" "No thanks sir, we don't want it. But if you want to make me that offer in a few years I might take you up on it then." How does that make any sense?

Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

Yeah bob, fifteen minutes is equal to three years. Moron.

What does the part about the date have to do with anything?

And since when did anyone here at Techdirt advocate murder?

And yes, I do feel entitled to it. Given that copyright law does not work in the digital era (in order for it to work, we as a society would have to accept a loss of a lot of freedoms, which is simply too high a price to pay), I feel I have the right to do what I will with the computer that I built myself from parts I purchased. To say I ought to obey copyright, to respect it, is too costly for me (and no, I don't just mean in terms of money, I mean in terms of my own natural human rights).

Re: Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

You have a right to do what you want with the computer you built with your own hands? Why? You clearly don't feel I have I have a right to do what I want with my computer which is (1) create some art and (2) sell it piece by piece to people who are willing to respect copyright.

Face it: you want to stop others from doing what they want to do with their computer. You're just an anarchist. You could easily just work with open source content and respect the wishes of other computer users, but you're just too selfish and self-centered. You want to believe that your needs trump everyone else's. That's sad.

Re: Re: Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

Go ahead, create and sell your art, I'm not stopping you.

What I will oppose is any attempt by you or people like to stop me doing what I will with my computer either through DRM, locking it down or through legislation (as long as the activity I want to engage in isn't 100% provable harmful, such as writing malware or distributing child porn).

And look who's talking "You want to believe that your needs trump everyone else's". Can't you understand? You have a need for your work to be protected by copyright. In order for that to somehow work, your need somehow trumps the rights of EVERYONE else on the planet to copy and use their equipment as they see fit.

I respect the wishes of other computer users once they respect mine. Respect is a two way street. Once they have earned my respect, then I am willing to throw some money their way.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

bob can't create and sell his art. He's too busy coming to this site trying to shame all of us into buying his art which he isn't making because he's scared we'll pirate it... despite the fact that we have no idea what it is.

Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

Only one problem. The things created by these businesses are actually for the public benefit, not for corporate benefit. Copyright is nothing more than a means to an end, benefitting the public. It is not a moral right for corporations, or artists, to actually own the "intellectual property". It is something created for us, not for them. This is exactly how it was written into the constitution. With how far copyright has gone in the wrong direction, "piracy" is actually a restoring to the public what was rightfully theirs all along.

This isn't to say that I go about pirating everything, mostly stuff that's no longer around, like old dos games and such. So this isn't some random pirate trying to justify not having to pay for stuff, The 50 some odd games I have on my Steam account testifies to my willingness to fork out money for the stuff I care about. Move copyright back to where it belongs, lessen the extreme and unbalanced power that exists right now, and focus more on the consumer (something a business is supposed to do anyway) and profits will undoubtedly go up.

Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

This must be the most crazy , idiotic senseless comment i have read in a long long time. Comparing copying to theft rape and murder, dam but you need help , and probably medication for those voices talking to you , that's the only way someone could honestly write a comment like this, if they were completely insane.

Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

Another typical bob comment. Take the premise of the article to its extreme, assert ridiculous, unrealistic conclusions, and then run the other way when anyone attempts to reconcile said post with logic.

Re: Why people steal, rape and murder

This is actually a good example Bob. Let's extend it:

If Sam's club treated it's customers like shit, Sam's club should and would go out of business. If Sam's club plan to stay in business was not to improve it's line, but to federally mandate long lines for everyone. People would laugh at them.

Maybe you are catching on as to why people laugh at the entertainment business.

and nor do any of the other studios or the music industry, the games industry or even the publishing industry. rather than do anything sensible that will keep them selling their products, these industries will do whatever they can to cause as much resentment for themselves by calling their own customers 'pirates' or 'thieves', whilst never giving what is asked for. what they do to their own artists, writers and technicians by refusing to pay them, is ignored. i gave up gaming when i found i was buying half a game and was then forced to pay to download the rest before i could play anything. i was then prevented from selling it on which, as far as i am aware, is the only non-2nd hand market there is. what would we have lost if there had been the same attitude to things over the last 1,000 years? our knowledge would have been a smidgeon to what it is, as would our art collections had things not been allowed to be passed or sold on. we are supposed to be superior now to then. i oft times wonder, given the ridiculous way we behave

Re:

Except, for most publishers, YOU are not the customer. Before starting iTunes, the music labels even told Jobs this when he asked them who their customers were. The same goes for movies and books too. They only deal with distributors, and their main concern is to give the distributors what they want. And you don't actually pay them either. No, your money goes to the retailer. Sure, the publisher's product eventually gets to you, and they eventually get some portion of your money in return, but they never have any contact with you...at all.

So why should they care? I'm sure you could name quite a few reasons, but none of them really matter. They have no direct relationship with you. And, of course, this is why the Internet will bring the demise of any publisher that doesn't try to connect with you, the end customer.

Stargate

I'm a big fan of Firefly as well,but an even bigger fan of Stargate SG1 and Atlantis.Both cancelled by NBC and replaced with SG Universe and wrestling.WTF!
So I gave up Fox and SyFy.(what does that even mean?)
So I started to imagine greater.(thank you SyFy for pointing me in the right direction)
What I imagined was a world where idiotic morons were not in charge of my entertainment choices and I cut the cable.
So now I use free OTA for the networks and some local channels and the internet.

Avatar in 3D. Now? Who'd gonna buy it? Stupidity beyond belief.

I don't know why these morons keep shooting themselves in the foot, but I'll happily provide them with bigger guns if they want.

Or conversely someone in marketing convinced the Fox lord high mucky mucks that the Panasonic TV deal would be the best thing in the world to do.
After the fall out of this stupidity, and the promotion of the aforementioned marketing genius, Fox was able to release the film in 3D.

Awwwww

Problem is that the studios don't think they will lose anything by releasing it now, they will have forced people to buy the dvd to add it to there collection and now be encouraging the same people to buy it on Blu Ray in 3d. Sad but this is what windows are for, to encourage people to waste money on one format then another a few years later.

The problem is that they will make a lot of money from this and that is why they do it.Yes they may not make the millions of sales they could have many years ago when the movie was in everyone's mind and everyone was buying a new 3d tv but they will still make a lot of money after they advertise it and get the public, who do not realize the way they are being played, to fork out again for this version.

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And because they're really good at keeping out the competition and they have extremely deep pockets since they've been at it for almost a 100 years. They might be firing people in Hollywood, but the studio heads will be the last to go.

honestly, for me...

I will only see 3D in the theaters because its more for the epic feel of a movie. If I am watching at home, I am happy to watch it without 3D. Considering the prices of these TVs, I am definitely happier this way.

Re: honestly, for me...

I totally agree. You know what's funny? The same could easily be said about the "Smoothe Motion" "Clear Frame" 120hz mode technology. The 120hz mode is nice because when you play a movie at 24 Frames Per Second, the shutter reminds me of a projector. But then I see the smooth motion that advertisers are lauding over saying you see more frames...it creates a soap opera effect and it's quite annoying.

In other words, I agree that (at least for now) that 3D TV is just as gimmickry and to me it currently is nothing more than a status symbol for now.

Re: Re: honestly, for me...

That soap opera effect goes away after a while. I've got a 240Hz 3D TV (just cause it was the same price as the 2D version) and after about a week of it you don't even notice anymore. The picture really does look better once you don't notice how different the picture is from a 60Hz set.

Re: Re: Re: honestly, for me...

Mine is a Todhiba 42L5200U (not 3D). I love 120hz mode being on. I have the ability to choose the type of smoothing from off to standard to smooth. Standalone 120hz mode when smoothing is set to off is a suberb thing because it's as clear as a film projector and it has the same wonderful feeling that only a silver screen projected film can give :-)

The only time I turn on smoothing is for fast paced sporting events :-)

Re: honestly, for me...

Me I can't stand 3d for home or theater.... from the few examples I've been forced to watch the effect to my eyes is more like the remembered Viewmaster of my youth than anything realistic looking or pleasant to look at.

I once borrowed a blu-ray of despicable me... it had 18 minutes of previews for movies I dont want to see and a number of spots telling me how great my entertainment would be with blu-ray (d'oh!) by the time the movie was on I didnt want to watch it. And MPAA wonders why people pirate. Oh and those previews? (like for Back to the Future) weren't skippable.

Re: Shovel those bits...

I have a bluray player, and I have yet to have to sit through 18 minutes of anything to get to the movie. I usually get to the movie in the same amount of time it would take to open my ripper and get a rip going.

Then again, with Netflix I just pull up my queue and press play. That beats everything.

Re:

Oh no no, I can one up this issue. I begin by saying this:

At least with Dispicable Me, you could use the "Skip Chapter" function. Black Jack's retelling of Guliver's Travles comes with a 15 minute long Anti-Piracy PSA where you cannot skip though it, and you cannot use the menus button.

Oh while I'm at it (I know, wrong article),
Since Disney pulled their contract from NetFlix's streaming services, more good movies have arrived in compensation. The Terminator, Conan The Barbarian remake, and Monty Pyrhon's The meaning of Life just to name a few :-)

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The nice thing about ripping a copy is the ability to strip out all the previews and anti-piracy bullshit. Not saying I would do something so immoral, but I've heard it can be done. Yeah, that's the ticket.

Well....

If only you had... it sooo begs the response "I'm trying hard to forget thanks!"

Despite everyone on the planet apparently believing that the movie was based on something they had themselves done

Hey, c'mon! That's only because it's one of the most formulaic pieces of pap going. I mean, pretty and everything but story? You can draw a parallel with almost anything if you try the story elements are so generic..

"Piracy" is the only way to obtain certain things. If you're in America, the only way you can see Traci Lords' early-80s movies or Disney's "Song Of The South" is by "piracy".
The internet is a great tool for getting rare, hard-to-find albums. Whether it's because it's out of print (in which case, there's no lost sale and nobody is being deprived of income), or because silly you bought it on tape instead of CD years ago, or you simply can't find it elsewhere, or whatever the reason is.

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And, moron, no one is justifying piracy. Yet again, you miss a simple point. What they are saying is that piracy is happening, it is going to keep happening, and the reason it happens is because of stupidity on the part of copyright holders. Stupidity that makes no sense in this day and age. So, the point was, piracy will happen as long as you keep making stupid business decisions and engaging in stupid business practices. Period.

Or, to put it even more simply, in this case, the biggest movie of the last decade, the movie that put 3D on the map (again), for some licensing/product endorsement reason that was beyond stupid (only available if you buy a certain brand of television), is three years after it's release FINALLY legally being made available for wide purchase in it's insanely profitable at the theater 3D format. "WTF?!" does not even begin to cover just how ridiculous that is.

None of it might say "do pirate", but for a great many, it's saying "not being sold". In that case, if it's not being sold, and it can be acquired elsewhere, I fail to see why they shouldn't get it through other means. After all, it's "not being sold". Not being sold = no loss.

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Again, no one is justifying piracy. My post was pointing out that it's going to happen. And as long as those in charge keep making dumb decisions to not sell a product then people will keep pirating. That's not justification. That's a fact.

"Stop justifying piracy, and the world gets better."

Stop with the dumb windowed releases, the moronic geo-windowed restrictions, the ridiculous pricing of digital offerings, the difficult in finding legal offerings, etc. etc. etc. and people will slowly stop pirating. And then the world will get better. (Because then in addition to piracy being lowered, you'll eventually see that you and your kind's attempts to "stop" piracy were all for naught and it was easily dealt with by giving the people what they want, as opposed to draconian laws that violate the rights of others.)

It's also interesting that you think if people stop justifying piracy the world will get better. Fucking hilarious. You don't say, hey let's stop fighting with one another over religious beliefs and the world will get better. You don't say let's give what we can to one another (as far as food stuffs and clothing and medications go) and the world will get better. Oh no, not you. You say, "stop justifying piracy, and the world gets better". Yeah, you aren't part of the problem at all? Your attitude and belief that because some see piracy happening and say "yeah, it's going to keep happening as long as you keep doing this" is justification. You couldn't be more wrong. It's simply being a realist and seeing that the problem doesn't lie with those doing the pirating, but with those like you not putting your products out there and then pissing and moaning that people can acquire it elsewhere. In a truly free market, you and your kind would have died/gone out of business decades ago. And you're barely able to survive even with government intervention.

Oh yes, I remember Avatar. I got a headache trying to watch it, and had to walk out halfway through. The headache went away in a few minutes, without medication. I've never seen the whole thing (haven't found a theater that shows it in non-headache-inducing format). I guess I'll catch it on tv when it comes around.

"Avatar" is a perfect example of a gimmick movie. Everyone wanted to see it for the 3D effect, which was kinda cool (the first time you saw it) even if it did make your eyes and/or head hurt. The movie itself is typical mass-produced Hollywood "content" that nobody would've given a second thought if it wasn't the "first 3D movie."

Re:

I could have gone to Wal-Mart and bought the DVD of "The Hunger Games" for around $20. Instead I rented it and burned it off ($2 rental, about $1 blank disc). So $20 vs. $3...which makes more economic sense?

watching avatar in Winnipeg

It is just another stupid mistake they made. My own experience is just nonsense.
After reading strong recommendations to watch this movie only in real 3d, I checked local iMax here in Winnipeg. There was a movie on schedule within a month or so. Me and my kid skipped the Cinema City and decided to wait. However, later all iMax show times were canceled. I was ready to pay but had no chance anymore.
Free download in HD was my only choice.